WORDS LIBRE

I’m trying to define you. Perhaps-- perhaps, it’s because you grow dim, like life seen through cellophane. So now, I must rescue you, your image, fast, whatever is left of it.

With words, tortured words.

You are a word.

Once, mysterious, a syllable I wasn’t acquainted with. So you could mean anything, so much, whatever comes without phrases-- an incomplete sunset for instance-- the kind that should have melted into red but refused to… the kind that turns a deep purple. Ah, the potential….

Then a word. Familiar. So “purple”, is no longer indeterminate, vague, a shade I’d have to build from scratch, around a million questions: “Does it ache?”, “Is it a secret?”, “Will it melt away?” It is purple. ‘Tis all. And this, my love, is just a kiss.

So now, you’re a word, the kind they call a cliché. One mouthed far too often. One that grows tired, like that kiss.

Sense it. Sense it again. Sense it now, with careless fingers. Sense it, till it smudges, then grows dull.

You’re a word-- dulled. You disappear.

And, now--- you’re not a word at all….